Our Own Choices
by Laurus Nobilis
Summary: TFA. When you are literally built for war, what do you do in times of peace?


**Our Own Choices**

The war wasn't _quite_ over. Ratchet knew that very well. But, right now, he was just glad that he and some of his friends could get out of the whole thing for a while. As selfish as it sounded, even to himself, there were some perks to being a close friend of the bot in charge. He felt a bit sorry for Prime, really, being thrown into this mess without even the time to react properly to everything. At least they had the certainty that it was temporary, with Ultra Magnus on the way to recovery.

Ratchet wasn't sure if he liked the idea of Ultra Magnus taking his old place again, but he wasn't ready to think about that just yet. There were a lot of things he still wasn't ready to think about.

Prime understood that. Even without Ratchet saying a word, which was a relief; he probably wouldn't have asked for anything, knowing himself. And yet, before he had time to even consider what was going to happen now that he was back on Cybertron, he found himself assigned to Project Omega.

The official version was that he was the best qualified to assess the damage that both Omega Supreme and Arcee had suffered during all those stellar cycles. In reality, it meant that all three of them got to stay somewhere quiet for a while. It meant that Ratchet didn't have to deal with nosy people asking him about a battle that was still too painful to think about, Arcee didn't have to worry about the sudden interest of the same scientists who had left her to rust as soon as she'd stopped being useful, and Omega didn't get sent to fight Decepticons at the edge of the galaxy. He didn't know how Prime had managed to convince the rest of the Council about it, but he certainly wasn't about to complain.

So here he was now, with two people he had thought he'd never see again, and with a lot of things to talk about – not only about what they had missed, but mostly about the future.

"What must I do now?" Omega asked him once, throwing him completely off guard. He looked up from the circuit he was repairing on his friend's shoulder joint and stared.

"_Must_?" he repeated. "What do you mean?"

"You said I don't have to fight anymore."

"That's right. You've had more than enough battles already, old friend. You're a hero." He patted the recently fixed armor-plating, smiling a little. "So now you get to rest and, well, do whatever you want for a change."

"… whatever I want."

Judging from his tone, it seemed that he had never even considered that possibility. The really sad thing was, Ratchet couldn't say he was surprised. No one had expected Omega Supreme to remain online once the war was over, so why let him get the idea that he could get to _choose_ what to do with himself? Those bots at the Ministry of Science were lucky he had better things to do than go and kick their skidplates.

"Anything at all," he said, saving his ranting for some other time. His friend seemed thought about it for a moment.

"Like what?" he asked at last.

This was getting complicated. Ratchet turned to Arcee, who was still watching history vids nearby. It was what she did most of the time, lately; catching up. He thought she was taking it pretty well, all things considered. And it was a good thing that she had two people who had actually _been there_ to tell her about the details that the official version got wrong. Right now, however, he was going to have to distract her for a while. An actual teacher would probably be better at explaining this kind of things.

"Er. Little help here?"

"Of course," she said. She paused the vid and approached them. "What is it?"

Ratchet explained. Omega stayed silent, expectant, while he waited for Arcee to think of her answer.

"You don't quite know what to do with yourself, hmm?" she said after a moment, with a knowing smile. "It happens to all of us at some point, when we realize we can make our own choices."

Yeah, and that point was usually a lot earlier, Ratchet thought. Earlier and without those pesky details about war and being a weapon of mass destruction. But she didn't mention any of that, and he was glad that he had let her do the talking.

"But you don't have to worry. There are plenty of things you can do," Arcee went on. "There are bots who create things – who design them, or build them, or repair them. There are scientists, and teachers, and medics…"

"And how do I choose?" Omega asked her.

"It takes time. You have to find out what you're good at." She smiled at him. "Find out what you _like_ to do."

"Yeah," said Ratchet. "You don't have to choose right now. You've got all the time you want."

There was a moment of silence while his friend considered their answers.

"I think," he said at last, "I want to learn."

Ratchet smiled – he was smiling a lot more often, lately – and patted his massive shoulder again.

"Well, old friend," he said, "we can help with that."


End file.
